She was anxious to get her hands on Margo Winter. Even as she watched the sun get lower in the sky, she thought through all the possible scenarios and savored the idea of finishing little Miss Margo last. She may even take pictures with her cell phone to send as a gift back to Dr. Williams. She smiled at the thought. He would really love that! And when she returned to the Facility, he would shower her with honors in front of everyone.
If anyone had been nearby they would have swore they heard giggling coming from what looked to be a thickly overgrown section of the mountainside, but no one was there except a deadly Farrow in the bush.
50 Patients Without Patience
“What happened?”
“You were shot.”
“What?”
“You were shot, son. We need to get you back to the lab.”
“Why am I on the floor?”
“Cole, look at me.” Theo lifted his son’s eyelids carefully, one at a time, and flashed a small pen light into them checking for reaction. “Do you know where you are?”
“Apparently, I’m on the floor,” Cole’s speech was beginning to slur.
“Whose house is this?”
“Paulie’s.”
“Do you know what day it is?”
“Um…” Cole mumbled and his eyes rolled back.
“Cole!”
“What?” His voice was groggy.
“Stay with me, buddy! Stay awake!”
“Okay, gosh stop yelling at me. I just got shot, ya know.” Cole furrowed his brows defiantly, blinked twice, then passed out.
They were on the opposite side of the house from the lab. Theo knew the others in the house wouldn’t hear him if he yelled for help and Cole was much too heavy for him to carry.
His eyes scanned the room for anything nearby that could help. The desk in the corner of the room had a plush rolling chair. Perfect! Though he didn’t want to let go of the pressure he was keeping on the gunshot wound, he needed to get the boy on the chair and wheel him to the lab—and he needed to do this quickly.
With a strength he didn’t even know he had, he pulled the unconscious boy into a sitting position on the chair. Keeping one hand on his son’s body to both steady him and maintain pressure on the bleeding wound, and the other hand on the back of the chair, he steered as quickly as he could across the house.
Theo ran directly to the sliding doors of the lab and cursed the slowness of the doors as they parted for him. He was already yelling to the two doctors inside for help before the second set of sliding doors even began to open.
“Cole’s been shot! Margo, Paulie! My son’s been shot!”
Though Dr. Andrews had seen gunshot wounds hundreds of times in the emergency room of his hospital back in Kansas, this was completely different. This was his little boy. He was shaking violently as he rushed his son to the same gurney Meg had occupied hours before.
“Oh, my God! What happened?” Margo had dropped what she was doing, literally and came running across the large room to Theo. She helped him lift Cole onto the bed.
“I don’t know. I think he let Maze out to relieve himself and…oh, God. There’s so much blood.”
“Did he say anything before he passed out?” Paulie was just a few steps behind Margo and was already reaching for saline to start cleaning the wound.
“No, nothing really—it all happened so fast.” Theo was standing back a little now, making room for the other two doctors to work on Cole.
“I’m starting an I.V.,” Margo said slipping easily into the role of ER doctor, herself. She reached for the medical cart beside her, yanked open a drawer and found the package she needed.
“The bullet looks to have gone right through the muscle in his upper arm. A sniper rifle did this; a long range, high-powered, rifle—I’d put money on it,” Paulie said shaking his head as he continued to assess the damages. “Damn, this bullet was traveling at one hell of a velocity, I can tell you that. He’s lucky it missed.”
“Missed?” Theo yelled in a flash of anger.
“Yeah, Theo. The shooter was aiming for his head.”
Dr. Andrew’s face fell silent and pale.
“You done over there, Margo? We need to turn him on his side so I can look at the back.”
“Almost,” she said as she grabbed white tape to secure the needle in place and covered the site with a large piece of sterile gauze.
“Okay, let’s roll him.”
“Well, from what I can see so far, the bullet missed the bone. Two inches north and we would have had a blown out shoulder joint.”
As Paulie examined, Margo set up a blood pressure and heart rate monitor. She also finished cutting off the remainder of Cole’s shirt to get it out of the way.
“It’s pretty miraculous, but the humerus looks intact. We’re going to have our hands full putting his biceps back together, though. Never thought I’d have to use my skills as an Army surgeon after forty years, but here we are.”
Theo had found a chair. “I should be helping,” he said weakly.
“You are helping, Theo. You pray while we work. Okay?” Margo said soothingly.
“We need to finish cleaning the wound and get started on reconstructing this muscle. Margo, ready with the anesthesia?”
“Yes, sir,” she said and handed Dr. St. Paul a syringe filled with a local pain killer.